


but fuck it, here we go

by KareliaSweet



Series: teach me to be brave [1]
Category: Check Please! (Webcomic)
Genre: Derek "Nursey" Nurse is Unchill, Internalized Homophobia, Kissing, Light Angst, M/M, Poetry, Romantic Gestures, Schmoop
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-07
Updated: 2017-01-07
Packaged: 2018-09-15 09:22:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,974
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9228638
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/KareliaSweet/pseuds/KareliaSweet
Summary: "Hi, um. I'm, uh, William Poindexter."Derek looks up to the stage in shock."I, uh, I've never done this before. I didn't even give this a title, I couldn't think of something good, but fuck it, here we go."





	

**Author's Note:**

> Hi I am new! to this fandom and I have a LOT! of feelings about these hockey nerds and I haven't written anything a while but here *throws a pile of schmoop* please come scream with me.

It hasn't been a great month for Derek. Between losing the game to Dartmouth - poorly -, losing his phone (or more accurately dropping it and breaking it to shit), and losing his fuckbuddy-slash-sort-of-best-friend in their nastiest fight yet, it's a wonder he isn't already passed out drunk this fine Monday evening.

Instead, he's at The Cantab on open mic night, prepared to freestyle his woes and wax melancholic about his broken-ass heart.

He hadn't expected Dex to break his heart. He hadn't expected him to leave so much as a dent in it. When they started doing whatever the fuck it was they were doing, it was clear that Dex intended to remain firmly closeted, publicly and privately. Everything between them had been in secret, mostly in the dark, in empty dorms and hotel rooms on away games where no one could see. No one could hear the sweet words Dex whispered to him then, when Dex had been _Will_ , and Derek's alone.

Derek hadn't expected the sweetness. In the end, that's what ruined him. The soft edges of William J. Poindexter revealed themselves one by one, and quietly. Each little piece that Derek caught in his hands sunk him just that much deeper, and in turn every brusque shoulder, every sneer in the light of day bruised him that much harder. Even when Will would tell him he was sorry, so sorry in the heat of the night, it didn't erase the Dex that pushed him away every cold morning.

So they fought, and made up, and fought, and made up, until the fight in which Derek had said the worst and cruelest thing possible.

He told Will he loved him.

"What the fuck, man, what am I supposed to do with that?" Dex had yelled.

"I don't know," Derek replied, "experience a human fucking emotion?"

"Oh fuck you, dude, you have no idea what it's like to be - to be-"

"To be what, gay?!"

"Shut the fuck up, Nurse."

"No," Derek stared him down. "You're gay, Will, and there's absolutely nothing wrong with that."

"Seriously, shut the fuck up."

"You think it's easy for me? Just because I'm out doesn't mean I don't have to deal with homophobic dicks all the goddamn time."

"It's different for you, you can - you can hide if you want."

"Oh fuck you and that biphobic shit, Will, you're better than that. And I don't _want_ to hide." Derek's voice broke then, and he hated the sound. "I want _you_."

"Don't - Derek - I can't give you that."

"Then I can't do this anymore."

"What the fuck, are you breaking up with me?"

Derek had snorted then, perhaps a little unkindly.

"No, I'm not, Dex. Cos we were never fucking together."

And that had been that. So now, eighteen days later – not that he’s counting – Derek sits, nursing a weakly mixed whiskey sour as he thinks of exactly the right words to sum up the clusterfuck that is his misery. He has half a stanza musing upon 'heart-shaped shards of auburn glass' scrawled poorly on a damp napkin when someone taps on the microphone.

"Hi, um. I'm, uh, William Poindexter."

Derek looks up to the stage in shock.

"I, uh, I've never done this before. I didn't even give this a title, I couldn't think of something good, but fuck it, here we go."

He clears his throat. Derek just stares at him, mouth slightly slack. Dex doesn't look up from the piece of paper he holds in his hands.

Hands that are shaking.

"I -, oh, I should say, this poem is for - wait, should I say names, I don't know, I'm fucking nervous as shit--"

He looks up and scans the crowd for a lifeline, a smile, a friendly face. His eyes meet Derek's.

"Yeah, you know who it's for," he half-whispers, like Derek is the only fucking person in the room.

"Okay." Dex says, to himself or to them both, Derek isn't sure, but then Dex looks away and back out at the crowd, determined.

"I always knew there was something wrong with my code.  
There was an error that I couldn't fix, some kind of bug embedded so deep  
that I couldn't see, couldn't reach, and it -  
it burned me up from the inside and I hated it.  
I hated it so fucking much  
this thing that I couldn't even see.

Let me start from the beginning--"

Dex takes a deep breath, eyes flicking back to the page. His hands stop shaking.

"I always knew that I was gay."

He says it with fire in his eyes, and defiance, and Derek loves him so achingly in that moment he thinks his heart might burst.

"I hated it so much that the hate turned into a red cloud  
and the cloud turned into a storm  
and I carried it with me  
every day  
and it just grew bigger and bigger  
until one day you looked at me and said

' _that's not a storm, that's a blanket_  
_let me climb under there with you_ '"

Dex's voice cracks sharply on 'blanket', becomes a whisper by 'you', his voice shrunk down with the weight of the tears he holds back. He meets Derek's eyes and he looks so, so sad.

"I still don't know why you did that."

It's barely audible, and Derek's not entirely sure if that was something he'd meant to say out loud. Dex blinks down at his feet, huffs out a half-shuddering breath and swallows, the click in his throat softly amplified by the mic. He sniffs loudly, and looks up.

"I wanted to write you a letter.  
Actually, this is a letter  
but I just hit enter a bunch of times in the spaces that I thought made sense  
until it kind of looked like a poem.  
Does that make it a poem?  
I don't fucking know."

He shrugs as he says it, and Derek laughs softly.

"All I know is that the only thing more terrifying  
than being gay  
is reading a poem  
a shitty poem that I wrote  
in front of a room full of strangers  
and you."

At this point, Derek is almost entirely sure that the bar has vacated. At least, it feels like it has, because all he can see is this trembling freckled boy who he loves so, so much spilling his heart out into a microphone, his bright red hair haloed by the spotlight.

"I'm not doing this for you."

Dex's mouth quirks in a tiny smirk and he looks at Derek again.

"Okay I'm doing this for you a little bit, but--"

His eyes grow sharp, and the slight slump in his shoulders melts away as he addresses the crowd once more.

"I'm doing this for Billy  
who always thought it was wrong to like boys  
who held his storm so close that he became the thunder  
I'm doing this for Dex  
who met you and spat thunder because you were the lightning  
and he was so fucking scared  
I'm doing this for Will  
who you called ‘babe’ in secret, always secret  
and you deserved so much better than being my goddamn secret"

Tears are running down Derek's face, and he doesn't care.

"I never said  
I loved it that you called me Will"

Will wipes his eyes with the back of his hand.

"Anyway, it's too late now, I fucking know that  
I'm not stupid, I ran the code, my errors run deep  
But you deserve to know that you made me brave  
and I figured what better way to show that  
than writing this to you  
(for you)"

He looks at Derek.

"because I fucking love you like a boat loves the ocean"

A long moment stretches out between them, and everything that Will is feeling is absorbed tenfold by Derek, and for a second he forgets how to breathe because the weight of this staggers him.

"and there it is  
I don't know what else to say except  
I'm sorry"

His voice cracks one more time.

"and thank you  
for sharing my blanket"

Silence. Will looks around nervously.

"Uh, thanks," Will says to the crowd, and then he shoves the paper into his back pocket and shuffles quickly offstage.

A chorus of finger snaps, along with scattered applause, rings up amidst the crowd. Someone yells an enthusiastic 'woo!', followed by someone else's loud whistle. Derek stands up, beaming, his own fingers snapping so hard they hurt. Will stands hesitantly just off the stage, out of the glare, but his blush is wonderfully clear even in the dim, smoky light. He looks at Derek and gives a small shrug, and Derek's feet are carrying him before he even tells them to.

Will's eyes go wide as Derek strides towards him, as if to say ' _Really?_ ', and Derek just nods as he gets closer, as if to say ' _Of course, you fucking idiot, this is the most beautiful thing anyone's ever done for me_.'

Then Derek trips over someone's feet, because that is his life. As he stumbles, Will barks out a huge laugh, and Derek can't help but flip him off, because that is their life, _this_ is their life, now.

The applause is just starting to die down when they reach each other, and Derek has words, so many words that he wants to say. Declarations and poetry of his own, but they all fall silent on his lips as he just looks at Will, drinking him in, his blush bleeding into his freckles, his amber eyes uncertain.

"You, uh, you liked it?" Will asks.

The chirp is on the edge of Derek's tongue, because chirping is second nature to them both, but Will has never sounded so scared and Derek wants nothing but to take that fear far, far away, so he grabs Will's hands in his and kisses the backs of them.

"I loved it," he says quietly. "I love you."

Will's gaze goes watery and he licks his lips, his mouth gone dry with nerves.

"You - still?"

"Yeah, course," Derek replies, and partly because he can't help himself and partly because he knows how much Will hates showing this much emotion at once, he says, "now stop fucking crying and kiss me."

Will laughs around his tears and pulls his hands from Derek's so he can punch him gently in the shoulder.

"Asshole," he murmurs, and brings their mouths together.

When they kiss, the entire room erupts in cheers and applause. It's like something out of a movie that Derek would love and Will would pretend to hate but secretly love, and they smile around their kiss, pulling each other closer.

Later, much later, Derek will write a poem about that kiss. He will say that kiss felt better than victory on ice, that it felt like returning to a home he never knew was his. He will say it tasted like cinnamon red hots, and saltwater, and that the shape of Will's mouth in that moment unfolded like so many precious secrets, and he took each secret and folded them within his own breast, carefully - so carefully, as lovers are meant to do. He will show this poem to Will with a wide smile on his face, still so happy after all these years.

When Will reads it, his lips will purse up in a soft smile that Derek catches before he can properly hide it away, and he will say ‘ _it's okay, I guess_ ’, and Derek will pounce on him and call him a fucking dick and pretend not to hear it when Will tells him to chill.

They will laugh, and wrestle, and kiss, in a bed that they bought together. Will, quietly, will whisper in his ear, ‘ _it's beautiful, babe_ ’.

Derek will smile, press his lips to his husband’s heart, and pull a blanket over them both.

**Author's Note:**

> Comments and kudos mean as much to me as Dex's shitty poetry thank you and have a 'swawesome day.


End file.
